Even if you’re not listening to spatially mixed audio, the speaker still sounds great. It has big, confident bass and higher detail, and can tune itself to your room using iOS or the speaker’s built-in microphones. It’s a little trickier to put together than the Era 100 above, and it’s also about twice the price, but it’s still worth considering if you have a larger space or a modern home with a more open floor plan.
There are a lot of smart speakers out there. Here are some other things we love:
- Amazon Echo Studio ($200) It is the best Alexa speaker. Don’t buy it for music quality alone, but the Echo Studio is right up there with the Google Home Max in terms of bold bass and room-filling soundstage. Its odd shape keeps it from the top of our list.
- Bose’s Home Speaker 500 ($379) It has Alexa, and a little extra. It certainly isn’t cheap, but this Bose speaker sounds really good (not as clear as the Sonos One, but great overall), and gets loud. It has Alexa, Bluetooth, a 3.5mm auxiliary port for connecting directly to your phone or MP3 player, and six useful preset buttons you can set to open a specific playlist or album from Spotify, Pandora, Amazon Music, and TuneIn. The screen on the front shows album art and a few other prompts but it’s not quite as effective as those on real smart displays.
- The Bang & Olufsen Beosound Level ($1,649) It is a great speaker that is built to last. The company designed the high-end model to be repairable and upgradeable over time. It’s made of natural canvas and wood for a truly sustainable “cradle-to-grave” experience. It’s a great flat speaker that comes with Google Assistant on board — or you can buy it without Smart Assistant for the same amount of money.
It’s nice looking, but Apple’s HomePod Mini ($99) (6/10, WIRED REVIEW) has the same issues as the original, larger HomePod speaker (5/10, WIRED REVIEW), including a higher price tag than most competitors, and muddy mid-range. It’s nowhere near the level of third-party smart home support you’ll find with Amazon or Google. You can get a full-size Nest or Echo speaker for the same money, and you should.
Why we prefer Google Assistant Speakers (for now)
There are plenty of reasons to love Amazon’s Alexa voice assistant, and it works well. If you like to use your voice assistant to shop or use Amazon services like Prime Music or Prime Video, an Alexa-powered speaker is probably the best for you.
The Google Assistant has fewer skills and is compatible with fewer smart home devices than Alexa, but it can do enough to qualify as truly useful, and Google is adding new skills at a rapid pace. Speakers with Google Assistant work best when linked together, and are compatible with a variety of Google apps and services. Google is better at answering random questions and telling you where to go out to eat since it can access the information and send it to your phone through Google apps.
Spotify, Pandora, and YouTube Music are the main ways to play music with Google Assistant, which covers most of your bases. The service can also cast Netflix shows and movies to your TV if you have a Chromecast connected.
Now is the time to buy models made by Apple and Google. Both released new speakers not long ago, and they should remain useful for several years because many of the improvements relate to the services that power each digital assistant rather than the speaker hardware itself.
It should be noted that none of these smart devices will last forever. Like every product with a computer inside it, eventually, every smart device will become obsolete. Stick to things that are made by great brands and support great ecosystems, and you’ll generally get more life out of your purchases.